Pigeon Post

The use of homing pigeons to carry messages is as old as the ancient Persians from whom the art of training the birds probably came from. The Greeks conveyed the names of Olympic victors to their various cities by this means. Before the telegraph this method of communication had a considerable vogue amongst stockbrokers and financiers. The Dutch government established a civil and military system in Java and Sumatra early in the last century, the birds being obtained from Baghdad. Details of the employment of pigeons during the siege of Paris in 1870-71 France led to a revival in the training of pigeons for military purposes. Numerous societies were established for keeping pigeons of this class in all important European countries; and, in time, various governments established systems of communication for military purposes by pigeon post. When the possibility of using the birds between military fortresses had been thoroughly tested attention was turned to their use for naval purposes, to send messages to ships in nearby waters. They were also used by news agencies and private individuals at various times. Governments in several countries established lofts of their own. Laws have been passed making the destruction of such pigeons a serious offense; premiums to stimulate efficiency have been offered to private societies, and rewards given for destruction of birds of prey. Before the advent of radio, pigeons were used by newspapers to report yacht races, and some yachts have actually been fitted with lofts.

During the establishment of formal pigeon post services, the registration of all birds was introduced. At the same time, in order to hinder the efficiency of the systems foreign countries, difficulties were placed in the way of the importation of their birds for training, and in a few cases falcons were specially trained to interrupt the service war-time, the Germans having set the example by employing hawks against the Paris pigeons in 1870-71. No satisfactory method of protecting the weaker birds seems to have been evolved, though the Chinese formerly provided their pigeons with whistles and bells to scare away birds of prey. However, as the radio telegraphy and telephony were developed, the use of pigeons was limited to fortress warfare as early as in the 1910's. As an example, British Admiralty discontinued its pigeon service in the early 20th century, although it had attained a remarkably high standard of efficiency. Nevertheless, large numbers of birds were still kept at the great inland fortresses of France, Germany and Russia at the outbreak of First World War.

Pigeon post of Paris

The pigeon post which was in operation while Paris was besieged during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 is probably the most famous. Barely six weeks after the outbreak of hostilities, the Emperor Napoleon III and the French Army of Chalons surrendered at Sedan on 2nd September 1870. There were two immediate consequences: the fall of the Second Empire and the swift Prussian advance on Paris. As had been expected, the normal channels of communication into and out of Paris were interrupted during the four-and-a-half months of the siege, and, indeed, it was not until the middle of February 1871 that the Prussians relaxed their control of the postal and telegraph services. With the encirclement of the city on 18th September, the last overhead telegraph wires were cut on the morning of 19th September, and the secret telegraph cable in the bed of the Seine was located and cut on 27th September. Although a number of postmen succeeded in passing through the Prussian lines in the earliest days of the siege, others were captured and shot, and there is no proof of any post, certainly after October, reaching Paris from the outside, apart from private letters carried by unofficial individuals. For an assured communication into Paris, the only successful method was by the time-honoured carrier-pigeon, and thousands of messages, official and private, were thus taken into the besieged city.
During the course of the siege, pigeons were regularly taken out of Paris by balloon. Initially, one of the pigeons carried by a balloon was released as soon as the balloon landed so that Paris could be apprised of its safe passage above the Prussian lines. Soon a regular service was in operation, based first at Tours and later at Poitiers. The pigeons were taken to their base after their arrival from Paris and when they had preened themselves, been fed and rested, they were ready for the return journey. Tours lies some 200 km from Paris and Poitiers some 300 km; to reduce the flight distance the pigeons were taken by train as far forward towards Paris as was safe from Prussian intervention. Before release, they were loaded with their despatches. The first despatch was dated 27th September and reached Paris on 1st October, but it was only from 16th October, when an official control was introduced, that a complete record was (text missing).
The pigeons carried two kinds of despatch: official and private, both of which are later described in detail. As has already been mentioned, the service was put into operation for the transmission of information from the Delegation to Paris and was opened to the public in early November. The private despatches were sent only when an official despatch was being sent, since the latter would have absolute priority. However, the introduction of the Dagron microfilms eased any problems there might have been in claims for transport since their volumetric requirements were very small. For example: one tube sent during January contained 21 microfilms, of which 6 were official despatches and 15 were private, whilst a later tube contained 16 private despatches and 2 official ones. In order to improve the chances of the despatches successfully reaching Paris, the same despatch was sent by several pigeons, one official despatch was repeated 35 times and the later private despatches were repeated on average 22 times. The records show that from 7th January to the end, 61 tubes were sent off, containing 246 official and 671 private despatches. The practice was to send off the despatches not only by pigeons of the same release but also of successive releases until Paris signaled the arrival of those despatches. When the pigeon reached its particular loft in Paris, its arrival was announced by a bell in the trap in the loft. Immediately, a watchman relieved it of its tube which was taken to the Central Telegraph Office where the content was carefully unpacked and placed between two thin sheets of glass. The photographs are said to have been projected by magic lantern on to a screen where the enlargement could be easily read and written down by a team of clerks.
This should certainly be true for the microfilms but the earlier despatches on photographic paper were read through microscopes. The transcribed messages were written out on forms (telegraph forms for private messages, with or without the special annotation "pigeon") and so delivered. The interval between sending a private message and its receipt by the addressee depended on many factors: the density of telegraphic traffic to and from the sender's town, the time taken to register the message, to pass it to the printers where it was assembled with its 3000 companions into a single page and then to assemble the pages into nines or twelves or sixteens.

The service was formally terminated on 1st February 1871. In fact, the last pigeons were released on 1st and 3rd February. The pigeons that were still alive were now official property and were sold at the Depot du Mobilier de l'Etat. Their value as racing pigeons was reflected by the average price of only 1 franc 50 centimes, but two pigeons, reported to have made three journeys, were purchased by an enthusiast for 26 francs.

The success of the pigeon post, both for official and for private messages, did not pass unnoticed by the military forces of the European powers and in the years that followed the Franco-Prussian War pigeon sections were established in their armies. The advent of wireless communication led to a diminution of their employment although in certain particular applications Pigeons provided the only method of communication. But never again were pigeons called upon to perform such a great public service as that which they had maintained during the siege of Paris.